


we're on our way somehow

by TheSushiMonster



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-02
Updated: 2014-05-02
Packaged: 2018-01-21 14:32:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1553750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSushiMonster/pseuds/TheSushiMonster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"His arm hurts." They're trapped under water and his arm hurts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	we're on our way somehow

**Author's Note:**

> Possible spoilers for 1x21 and 1x22, based on the art released for "Ragtag."
> 
> Unbeta-ed, pretty much a venting piece for me, and I am sans-social networking, so this is utter crap. I'll probably delete it in a couple days. (Usually I'd just post it to tumblr, but anyway.)

His arm hurts.

Fitz hits his head against the wall once again, ignoring Simmons’ glares. She’s can’t stop fidgeting, each breath of air makes his chest burn, and his arm hurts. Glancing through the thin window only makes his stomach churn, especially when the surrounding metal cracks further. It feels like their shelter is their crutch, and Fitz curls his knees into his chest.

His arm fucking hurts.

“Stop hitting your head against the wall.” It’s the first thing either of them have said for the past ten minutes, Fitz suspects in an effort to preserve oxygen. He’s not sure it’s working very well. “The more pain you’re in, the more air you need.”

Fitz grits his teeth. “It doesn’t matter, does it?”

She glares him, eyes full of reckless nervousness and narrowed intensity. She is contained wildness, the single strand of hair curled onto her cheek the first wisp of control slipping through her grip. “We are getting out of here alive. Both of us.”

Fitz clenches his jaw and hugs his knees closer.

“You know when - after Audrey - when I told you I hated change?” says Fitz, glancing up at bent metal. The scraps could crack and pierce through him right then, and maybe then she’d have enough air to live. The anchor wraps around his neck, pulling him deeper. “I - that wasn’t all of it.”

“Fitz - “ She watches him, he knows she does, and he imagines that her eyes are woollen scarves that dresses around him in winter. It reminds him of his mum and Christmas and hot chocolate made with hot water.

“We - we never had the right timing, did we?” he says, following the droplet of water crawling closer towards him. He wishes it was darker, colored, tinged with blood. The edges of his vision grow hazy. “Was there ever going to be a right time?”

She doesn’t say anything this time. Fitz feels her eyes still on him, searching and imploring and waiting - always waiting.

“I love you,” he says. His heart hurts. Laughter from long ago still echoes in his ears. “You know that. But I just - I love you,” he says, again, and this time he looks at her. He meets her eyes - and when he does, the fire in his chest finally gives out, his ribs finally cave in, and he can feel his entire arm turn numb.

It’s simple really - the two them bent over sketches and plans, the three of them laughing in their lab, the four of them bickering and solving puzzles, the six of them together - home. The images quickly slip through his fingers, dissolve in the crushing sea, disappear as if they never happened. They’re torn apart into shreds that fly away and _fuck_ , his arm hurts.

Jemma moves towards him. “Fitz - “ she starts, but when her hand reaches his shoulder, she pulls back, eyes wide. “You’re bleeding.”

He glances down at her hand, painted in red, and then to his arm. “Huh.”

For the first time in several days - too long, the rocks are crushing her, she’s doing too much, doing _too damn much_ \- her voice stalls. The diamonds in her eyes crystallize on her skin and when Jemma finally looks him in the eyes, she cries. “Fitz.”

He smiles, sad and resigned, because the blood is warm where it drips down his wrist. “Told you.”

“You - “ she can’t laugh, the light in her eyes dimmed and swelted by the increasing water pressure. If only he could have punched Ward straight in the face. “I - “

“I know,” he says, because having her say it out loud, he finds, is too real. It’s too much. He’s probably dying, and she’s probably dying, and it’s all too much, all at once. “I - “ the flash of fire that fills him dulls quickly but the vision of Jemma swims in and out, glossy and sepia. “Thank you.”

“Fitz,” she says and this time her voice is a sob, and he can’t decide whether he rather not hear her tears, or whether he’s glad she’s finally embracing them. “Fitz, you can’t - please - “

“Hey,” he says, and it’s struggle to keep his eyes open, but he tries, for her. “After me, who do you trust the most?”

“May,” she says without hesitation.

Fitz grins, muscles pulling against the faint heartbeats that struggle to escape his chest. “Then the Cavalry is on her way.” Jemma’s hand laces through his, and for the only time in his life, she’s not cold to the touch.

Jemma shivers, but only holds onto his hand harder. “I’m sorry.”

“You have - nothing to be - sorry - for,” he says, slowly, his lungs burning with each inhalation. Her fingers are warm. “I’m the one leaving - “ It hurts too much to say much else, especially when his entire left side has fallen away. He’s barely a ghost, half-together, mostly dependent on her nails digging into his palm. Even when he edges the cliff, ready to distribute weight and fly away, she tethers him, string tightly fastened all the way to the space between breaths.

It’s very dark when he closes his eyes. Jemma cries louder, and he pushes past the increasing darkness to look at her - she’s very white in the navy that collapses around them. Her fingers are very warm. “I love you, Jemma,” he says, or he tries to, but his mouth is too hard and his tongue too heavy. It’s hard to breathe.

“I love you, Jemma,” he says, or he tries to, but her grip is tighter and the blood is cold on his left palm.

“I love you, Jemma,” he says, or tries to, but her lips barely tingle against his forehead when all he sees is black.

 _I love you, Jemma_ , he thinks. And he likes to believe she hears him before everything falls away.

 


End file.
